


Fault Lines

by Bookwormscififan



Category: A Heist With Markiplier (Web Series), Who Killed Markiplier? (Web Series), markiplier - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Animatronics, Gen, Possessed Animatronics (Five Nights at Freddy's)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 20:02:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29922111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bookwormscififan/pseuds/Bookwormscififan
Summary: “Was it my fault? Was it?”No amount of multiverse travelling would prepare him for this interview.
Kudos: 12





	Fault Lines

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! This is extremely inspired by Mark’s newest Wilford video, and even includes not just references but full quotes, so if you haven’t watched it, then please do before reading this!

_ God, what have I done? _

The guilt weighed heavy on his heart. He kept trying to swallow back the lump that was ever-present in his chest. 

What should he do? Should he call for help? Hide the body? He growled to himself, running his shaking hands through his hair in frustration. 

_ Feelings. Horrible things. They always get me in trouble. _

How had this all started?  The party . What were they even supposed to celebrate? What did Mark know that he didn’t? 

Guns were strange objects. Sometimes people forget they’re loaded, and they just pull the trigger. Bullets did so much damage.

He sat opposite the corpse lying on the floor, watching the colour fade from their appearance with every passing hour. 

_ Why did I do that? _ Why did he shoot? What did this person do? They were innocent, so did that mean he was wrong?

Life was weird. Crazy, maddening. 

When the corpse rose up again the following morning as though nothing had happened, something snapped. 

He went on a rampage, looking for the mayor. Something made no sense; how could they still be alive when he had shot them?

The detective - Abe - came to find him, confused by remembering things that hadn’t happened. He hunted with no proper goal, just to arrest him. It was weird. 

It’s impossible to survive a bullet to the heart. 

Madness became a survival instinct for him. He had to embrace his insanity so that he could cope with the newfound ability to move between universes. 

The first time he managed to do it, it terrified him. One minute he was alone, and the next he was on a train with friends, investigating a murder. 

Was it possible to be the same person after traversing multiverses? He didn’t know anymore. 

Sensing rifts in the space-time continuum was overwhelming at first, but then he managed to filter the results to centre around his friends. Closing rifts was his job... for a while.

When that got boring, he started to spend time in different universes, interviewing movie characters and changing reality to how he wanted it. 

The interviews kept him distracted; he didn’t think about the murders when he was interviewing. 

This new place, though. Building animatronics. It was fun. 

There was technology around here that was able to scan his brain and imprint the exact readings onto the things he created. 

The Warfstache Automated Interview Automaton - WAIA - was a breakthrough in his adventures. The perfect copy of his own noggin, colours he chose and design to his liking. 

Sure, it had some faults. The metal was slightly bent in some places, and its jaw didn’t close properly, but it had  _personality_.

He had programmed it as an interview robot, complete with dialogue prompts and poses so he could conduct interviews  _ without even having to be in the room _ !

Something had happened after the first model came off the belt. It lit up on its own, and some nights he would hear it talking...  _ without being prompted _ . The sounds it made at 5am were terrifying, and soon enough he realised the words  _ nightmare garbage _ were off limits. 

Still, he knew it would learn to act properly with some controlled shocks, so he executed the process and sat it in a room. 

Some bright person volunteered for the trial, and he recorded several voiceovers to direct them. He didn’t want to be in that room if it acted up again. 

Watching over the footage from the trial after the volunteer left, he frowned at the interview section. 

“ _ A man goes to a party. This man met an old friend. The two friends share some wine. The two friends played a game. The most dangerous game. I didn’t know the gun was loaded. I didn’t know. Was it my fault? Was it? _ ” 

He hadn’t programmed that question. Why did the animatronic ask that? 

He sat in his room in front of the computer, gun in hand. His suspenders had slipped off his shoulders at some point during the review, and now sat across his elbows as he rested them on his knees. 

_ Was it my fault? Did I really kill them all? _

A memory flashed in his mind, and he suddenly saw himself back in that cursed mansion, watching a body the whole night.

When he blinked, he was back in his room, and the gun had fallen to the floor as his shaking hands ran through his hair once more. 

“Was it my fault?”

He leaned back toward the computer, reaching to play. The volunteer said yes.  _Really_?

“ _Oh. Sorry. For everything that I’ve done. I don’t remember who I was. I wish I did. That man... I’m sorry. Potato salad._ ” 

He fell back in his chair, stunned. His mind raced.  _Who was I_? Try as he might, he couldn’t remember the man from all those years ago. 

How could an animatronic with the exact copy of his own noggin - oh.  _Oh_. 

He had heard something about subconscious thoughts before. Thoughts one doesn’t realise they’re having. The deep down thoughts and ideas that surface when you sleep.

Had the animatronic... registered those thoughts? Did he really regret what he’d done?

The room was silent as the computer went into sleep mode. He still sat, staring at the black screen. He was speechless, with no idea what to do next. Was it really alright to have interview automatons around the world if they all ended like that one?

His hands shook, and he felt cold all over suddenly. His mind was going blank as he tried to organise his thoughts.

Interviewer, colonel, madman, criminal. What was he? 

Friend, lover, enemy, stranger. What did people see?

Tears stung his eyes as he reached one single coherent thought.

_ Who am I? _

**Author's Note:**

> Good word, this one is long... and quite moving. Sorry about that. I hope I didn’t make you sad. If you liked this, please remember to leave kudos and comments!


End file.
